Extreme cooling for 5 minutes a day can improve sleep, mood: study

The intense cold can shock the body – but it may also be able to help you fall asleep and stay that way.

A new study by researchers at the University of Montreal and the University of Poitiers found that spending just five minutes in a cold room cooled to a negative 130 degrees Fahrenheit may be the key to achieving a deeper, more restful sleep. .

In this remarkable experiment, 20 healthy young adults – nine women and 11 men, all about 23 years old on average – stripped down to underwear, socks, Croc-style shoes and gloves to endure cryostimulation sessions for five consecutive days .

The results? “Slow-wave sleep, considered the most restorative stage of sleep, increased by an average of 7.3 minutes during the first two sleep cycles. [following cryotherapy],” Olivier Dupuy, an associate professor at UdeM’s School of Kinesiology and Physical Activity Sciences, who served as lead author of the study, said in a statement.

But this is not a one-off deal. The study, published in the December issue of the Journal Cryobiology, found that just one freezing session was not enough to improve sleep, with the benefits only appearing after five consecutive chills.

The researchers also identified a marked gender difference, with women appearing to enjoy a greater advantage from the ice than men.

While the study included participants without sleep problems, the researchers said that cryostimulation may be especially helpful for those who struggle to get enough shut-eye.

In 2020, the most recent year for which federal data is available, 14.5% of American adults had trouble sleeping most or every day in the past month, and 17.8% of adults had trouble staying asleep, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. for Disease Control and Prevention.

An added bonus: The extreme cold can help your mood, too. Repeated cryotherapy sessions had a positive effect on the participants’ psychological well-being, reducing their anxiety and improving their overall mood, with women also reaping more of these benefits.

There is also an advantage for sports stars.

“For elite athletes, it can help with recovery, while for the general population, it can help people with chronic inflammation or mild dementia when used in combination with physical exercise,” Dupuy said.

The study was part of a larger effort to understand the effect of cryostimulation on the body, which began earlier this year when Dupuy and his colleagues received funding to study its use in athletes preparing for the 2024 Paris Olympics. .

Other research has shown that time spent in the cold room can help ease muscle and joint pain, boost the immune system and increase energy levels. For skincare aficionados, the treatment has even been shown to stimulate collagen production.

There are still many lingering questions about how cryostimulation might help other diseases, but Dupy said one thing is clear: “This is not a placebo effect.”